1. Field of Invention
The invention relates to a process for processing print carriers, printed with security paper prints, in the form of security paper webs or security paper sheets, the security paper prints of which are arranged in the manner of matrices in transverse rows and longitudinal row, to form bundles of security papers from numbered individual security papers, following which the print carriers, after the spoilt notes detected on them have been marked, pass through a numbering machine and, after the print carriers have been cut up, the spoilt notes are separated out.
2. The Prior Art
One of the main problems in the production of security papers, particularly in the manufacture of banknotes, is to obtain bundles of security papers or parcels of security papers in which the security papers have a complete numerical sequence, that is to say, they are serially numbered correctly within a certain numerical series. This kind of complete numerical sequence is very important both for organising manufacture and as a protection against forgeries.
In the essentially fully automatic manufacture and processing of security papers as developed and introduced in recent years, however, difficulties arise in obtaining bundles of security papers with a complete numerical sequence, owing to the spoilt notes which appears virtually invariably and have to be separated out. These difficulties are connected with the hitherto customarty numbering and processing methods.
A known process for processing security paper sheets is described, for example, in West German Pat. No. 2,502,987 and in U.S. Pats. Nos. 3,939,621 and 4,045,944. There, the freshly printed security paper sheets, containing unnumbered security paper prints, arranged in the manner of matrices in rowss and columns, are visually checked, security paper prints, identified as spoilt notes, being provided, for ultimate separation, with a mark to which a detector responds. All the security paper sheets then pass through a numbering machine in which all security paper prints, that is to say also the spoilt notes, are numbered on each sheet.
In the hitherto customary numbering, all those security paper prints are always provided with a serial number sequence which are situated in the same security paper positions of successive sheets, that is to say, always in the same row and in the same column. In the stack of sheets formed at the exit of the numbering machine which generally contains 100 sheets, therefore, all the superimposed security paper prints which represent a bundle of security papers when the stack of sheets has been cut up afterwards, always have a serial number sequence. In this case, all the security paper positions of a sheet may have identical numbering and differ by different serial indications.
Subsequently, the numbered sheet stacks are cut up to form bundles of individual security papers and only then those security paper bundles are separated out from the transport sequence of the individual bundles which contain one or more spoilt notes. These separated security paper bundles are submitted to a parallel processing operation in which the spoilt note or notes are eliminated and replaced by satisfactory security papers; these replacement security papers are either numbered with the number of a special series or they are provided in a manual numbering device with the number of the extracted spoilt note, so that complete numerical sequence is ensured within that bundle. The complete bundle thus reconstituted is replaced in the appropriate position of the transport sequence of the bundle that had been satisfactory from the start, before the bundle parcels are made up.
For making up the bundle parcels in which all security papers have a correct serial number sequence within the same numerical series, the security paper bundles formed in succession when the sheet stacks have been cut have to be sorted in such a way that the bundles from successivee sheet stacks, belonging to the same numerical series, are assembled together. This type of automatic sorting and bundle stacking device is described in the above-mentioned patent specifications.
The processing method explained above, which enables complete numerical sequences to be produced within the security paper bundles and security paper parcels formed, despite the separation of spoilt notes, has not gained acceptance in practice, however, because the special treatment of the security paper bundles, containing spoilt notes, is labour-intensive and time-consuming and the normal working rate at which satisfactory bundles of security papers, free from spoilt notes, were able to be processed had frequently to be lowered.
Another known process that has been practised, according to which complete numerical sequences are ensures within the security paper bundles formed in the processing of security paper sheets consists in separating out, after the visual check on the freshly printed security paper sheets and already before the numbering operation, all those sheets on which at least one spoilt note had been detected and marked. In this case, therefore, only sheets with satisfactory security paper prints are introduced into the numbering machine and the resulting numbered sheet stacks are processed further, as described above. The disadvantage in this case is the fact that the security paper sheets, containing spoilt notes, have to be submitted to special processing, unless they are to be destroyed, uneconomically, in toto. This special processing consists in first cutting up the unumbered sheets into individual security papers of final size, then separating out the marked spoilt notes and giving the remaining, satisfactory, security papers a serial numbering in a numbering machine for individual security papers, these numbers belonging to a special series.
For security papers produced by web printing, there is as yet no resonable and practicable method of maintaining the complete numerical sequence, if spoilt notes have to be separated out when the web have been cut up into individual securuty papers, as is virtually always the case. Therefore, all the security papers, including the spoilt notes, have been numbered in web printing so far and only the numbers of the then separated spoilt notes have been recorded, so as to have a check, but a complete numerical sequence of the satisfactory security papers to be issued was not obtainable.